HTTCA - Review #1, Pipilotti Rist "Worry Will Vanish"
‘Worry Will Vanish’ is a video installation of juxtaposing images from the artist, Pipilotti Rist. She used a relaxation process known as ‘Autogenic Training’ to create a mood that psychiatrists have used since the 1930s. This process of evoking emotion as well as displaying a contrast of images is suggestive of the Dada and Surrealist period. During the First World War, André Breton used Freud’s psychoanalytic methods to help soldiers from shell shock. Freud’s work on dream analysis, free association and the unconscious helped develop methods of practice within Surrealism. Philippe Soupault alongside Breton was involved in activities such as ‘automatic writing’ and later wrote “The Magnetic Fields” (1920). To relate, André Masson created the artwork “Automatic Drawing” in 1924, which relays the same method of practice, letting the unconscious mind out and allowing freedom of movement. The poet Pierre Reverdy commented on the notion of juxtaposition “the more the relationship between the two juxtaposed realities is distant and true, the stronger the image will be…”
Surrealists also considered the works of Marxist critic Walter Benjamin and he discusses how through modern technologies like the evolution of photography and mass media, the concept of mass production ruins the essence of original work. He wrote the essay “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” in 1936, which discusses how photography threatens the traditional aspect of art like avant-garde artwork. The use of printing press meant that you can recreate large quantities of the same image in a book, on posters or anywhere the media was going. He believed that this de-values the piece of art and takes away its sense of “aura” as a “one off”. Rist’s work is better experienced in the flesh but the internet today enables you to experience it anywhere.
In Modernism, changes sparked everywhere and introduced a new kind of revolution in many industries. Rist’s use of projectors was because of the continuing development in new technologies like finding new sources for power. The entertainment industry benefitted from its first movie theatre in 1905 the “Pittsburgh Nickelodeon” and since then, would have impacted on Rist’s expression of moving image today.
The moving images Rist produced were a mixture of nature and the human body, subjects that were in Realism. Their ‘Mirror Theory’ was that the mind could represent objects to be accurate and true as if they were in front of you. Paul Cézanne had a different approach to representation as an impressionist painter. He created ‘Unified Field Theory’ which meant that he chose to focus on “not painting the reality, but the effect of perceiving it”. Impressionist painters like Monet, considered the appearance of light and movement. Rist’s overlapping projections of different image depicts fluidity in movement that is associated with nature therefore showing the effect of observing the nature rather than trying to recreate it.
Historically, the war had an emotional affect on everyone involved because nation had rose upon nation and left misery upon the world. Expressionism was a part of the avant-garde movement which was before the war but remained popular during the Weimar republic. “The Scream” by Edvard Munch in 1893 was the beginning of inspiration for the expressionists. Its ideology was that the world is to be presented in a subjective manner, therefore creating an emotive affect to the viewer. Distorting images again was similar to Rist’s choice of fragmenting nature, but not in a geometric style like the Cubist movement. To evoke a relaxing mood for the audience has been a progression of surrealist thinkers as well as a practice for the expressionists. When you consider expressionist cinema, colour and sounds were prominent for example in Douglas Sirk’s work.
Modernism brought changes in technology and society as well as an array of artistic movements. This would have helped Pipilotti Rist’s work today and changed the way we perceive art visually and subjectively.
‘Worry Will Vanish’ (2014) Video Installation by Pipilotti Rist. Hauser and Wirth Gallery.